Page:The Church of England, its catholicity and continuity.djvu/179

 was shown in the election of Bishops. Not only was the Church practically dead throughout the reign of the early Georges, but even Dissent had very little life. The ideal of morality was very low. As I am unable to spend much time in discussing this period of our history, I will give you the opinion of Professor Green on the religious state of England just before the revival of religion under the Wesleys. "A Welsh Bishop avowed that he had seen his Diocese but once, and habitually resided at the Lakes of Westmoreland. The system of pluralities turned the wealthier and more learned of the priesthood into absentees, while the bulk of them were indolent, poor, and without social consideration. A shrewd, if prejudiced, observer brands the English clergy of the day as the most lifeless in Europe, 'the most remiss of their labours in private, and the least severe in their lives.' The decay of the great dissenting bodies went hand in hand with that of the Church, and during the early part of the century the Nonconformists declined in number and in energy." Green further says "that not a new parish had been created. Hardly a single new Church had been built. Schools there were none, save the Grammar Schools of Edward and Elizabeth. The rural peasantry, who were fast being reduced to pauperism by the abuse of the poor laws, were left without moral or religious training of any sort. 'We saw but one Bible in the Parish of Cheddar,' said Hannah More at a far later time, 'and that was used to prop a flower pot.'" It was because of this state of things that the revival of religion took place under the Wesleys at Oxford. They themselves held private